The Aditya-L1 was launched successfully on Saturday and inserted into orbit as per the plan. This is India’s first mission to study the Sun, and is a natural next step (if you think about it) after a successful moon mission. The planned duration of the mission is 5.2 years.
Was talking to Jani yesterday and she asked what the L1 point was, and I had just assumed everyone knew what it was because I knew it. But then I realized that this is not common knowledge though more people are learning about it thanks to the coverage of the Aditya-L1 mission. Basically, the definition is as below:
Lagrange points are positions in space where objects sent there tend to stay put. At Lagrange points, the gravitational pull of two large masses precisely equals the centripetal force required for a small object to move with them. These points in space can be used by spacecraft to reduce fuel consumption needed to remain in position.
To put in a simpler way, this is a place between the Earth and Sun where the gravitational pull of the sun is cancelled by the gravitational pull of the Earth. There are multiple such points around the solar system. The L1 point is approximately 1.5 million km away from Earth (about 1% of the Earth-Sun distance)
Visual depiction of Lagrange Points, curtsy of ISRO
The Indian space program is shining because of their two back to back missions where very few other countries have succeeded in the past, so obviously we have folks in the western media claiming that the Chandrayaan-3 mission was faked and lots of editorials where ‘experts’ talk about how India should focus on feeding its poor instead of the space program. These folks need to take a closer look at their own countries and the state of their poor & the state of their infra instead of lecturing India.
That being said, not everyone responded in a racist way, plenty of publications covered the mission and were complementary about how much India has achieved in the past few years. Ars Technica did a pretty indepth and balanced walk through of India’s space programs and how it ranks against the other global powers.
Also, to those who from the UK who are asking for their ‘aid money’ back (which was actually investment money being shown as aid money), you are more than welcome to ask for it back after you pay back all the money the British Raj looted from India, and have returned all the stolen treasures being showcased in the British museum. Actually, why don’t we do this: deduct the money you claim to have sent for aid and then return the rest and then we can talk. Till then we will keep ignoring you.
Jai Hind.
– Suramya